


Letters Unanswered

by Centeris2



Category: The Dreamer (Webcomic)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-01
Updated: 2017-01-01
Packaged: 2018-09-13 21:34:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,301
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9143170
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Centeris2/pseuds/Centeris2
Summary: Takes part in the same sort of universe as The Dreams of a Farmer. Originally started as a prompt for a cross over of The Notebook and The Dreamer.Beatrice confronts Alan about all the letters she sent him, demanding to know why he never wrote to her.





	

“So, I wrote you a bunch of letters one summer?” Alan wasn’t entirely sure what Beatrice’s question was, or even what had started that train of thought in her for her to ask.

“You wrote me many letters.” Given she wasn’t terribly specific he decided to go with a safe response until he understood what she was after.

“I mean the summer I wrote about Milly Weaver. I only had a chance to read the one letter, but it seemed like I had written to you often.” Alan found it endearing that Beatrice was trying to remain collected and nonchalant, although the fingering of her jean pockets indicated she was not asking this out of idle curiosity.

“Yes, you did.” She glared up at him with a pout. The odd style of adding colored powder and liquid to the face in the future made her look a bit strange to him, but no less beautiful. And she was downright adorable when she was grumpy at him over trivial things. She had no yet reached her terrifying level of anger.

“And you kept one of them?”

“I kept all of them that I could.” He knew a few had gotten lost along the way just from traveling and moving trunks and bags, but he was sure he knew where the majority of the letters were.

“Why didn’t you write me back? I understand if you were busy but it seemed like you were ignoring me for months.” He was surprised by how hurt she looked, even though she had no memories of the event. But her dejected look and her downward gaze away from him made him bow his head in shamed embarrassment.

“I… I was.”

“Why?” She didn’t look at him, but merely mumbled the question.

“It was for your own good!” That was what he had told himself, but he said it out loud much more forcefully than he meant to. She jumped a bit and looked at him, her frustration coming back.

“If you didn’t want me writing letters why didn’t you just tell me to stop writing to you?”

“I didn’t have the heart to.” She did not appreciate his red face and look away from her.

“But you had the heart to break mine?” That demand made him look back and he remembered just how frustrating the love of his life could be.

“I don’t mean it like that!” 

“Then how did you mean it?”

“I’m a farmer, Bea, I don’t belong in high society or the royal circle of Boston. That’s the world your family is in, and I’m not from it.” She stared at him for a moment, her mouth slightly open in shock but her eyebrows knit together as no doubt angry thoughts rushed through her head

‘Wait, you stopped writing to me because you didn’t feel good enough to be with me? Where did you get an idiotic idea like that! It was clear in the one letter that I preferred being with you on your farm with your family than I did spending a summer at high society parties!”

“Your parents were quite clear that I was not cut of the same cloth. Them being Tories and me being a patriot didn’t help either.” He muttered sourly, although that was no longer an issue. When Alan had promised to rescue Bea from General Howe he had also swore to her father that he was going to marry her. Not surprisingly, her father had no objections. Bea, meanwhile, was pinching the bridge of her nose while she took a deep breath and processed what to say next.

“So, what? Break my heart by ignoring me? Keep me waiting and hoping for a letter from you every day? That was your plan?” 

“Yes. No. I… I didn’t know what to do,” he muttered sheepishly, first meeting her gaze and then looking away as he lost conviction in his words.

“Did you think I would go away?”

“I hoped you would move past me and get on with your life.”

“You pretty clearly were my life! If you wanted me to forget about you, why didn’t you tell me to stop writing and that you didn’t love me!”

“Because I couldn’t do that!” The mere suggestion of lying to her, especially to break her heart and his own, was still painful.

“Oh, right, you ‘didn’t have the heart’ to do it! Thought it’d be more merciful to drown me in silence?”

“I didn’t have the heart to do that to myself! Or you! I wasn’t strong enough! I couldn’t lie to you when I wanted nothing more than to be with you!” With that finally out in the open he thought her anger with him would dissipate. Instead it took an entirely unexpected direction.

“This is the exact type of thing that gets so frustrating in movies!”

“Movies?”

“Right, of course John hasn’t shown you any movies or anything. Point is you’re an idiot!” She jabbed him with a finger for emphasis.

“I was doing it for you!” At this point it was his only defense that he had.

“You were being selfish! You saw how much I loved you and missed you, but instead of facing the problem and your fears of inadequacy you ignored it like a coward and hoped it would go away!” He wasn’t sure if he was more insulted about being called a coward or the implication that he might be inadequate.

“I am no coward!” The coward insult hurt more.

“What else would you call it? A tactical retreat away from the love of your life in the hopes she’ll stop chasing you because you didn’t just tell her what you were feeling and afraid of?” She raised an eyebrow, staring him down as he opened his mouth, thought, closed his mouth again, and then pouted.

“Well when you put it like that…”

“Okay I don’t care if it breaks the past somehow, we are watching The Notebook and if you still don’t get why you are an idiot-“ Alan sighed and cut her off, still not understanding what she was really talking about when it came to The Notebook.

“I’m a fool. I know that now, Bea. I learned that when I found out you had been taken by Howe, when you told us about the powder. But I am also terrified of you getting hurt, so naturally you decided to run headlong into danger.” He grumbled the last part, damning her own stubbornness and lack of self-preservation in his thoughts.

“Only because it would help you, Mr. Warren. You were in the fray, and I wanted to stay at your side.” At this she became soft once more, leaning into him again from their seat on the porch as if to add emphasis by literally being at his side.

“You’re a fool, putting yourself in danger.”

“Then we’re both fools.” She teased, not looking up at him as she grinned.

“So, what’s The Notebook? A moving picture about a book?” He tried to change the subject as he once more placed his arm around her, happy to once more be cuddling.

“Oh my god I’m going to make you cry. But promise me, if we’re ever separated like that again and I have to write letters to keep in touch, don’t be a jerk and write me back! I don’t want to hear that you’re alive from women talking about your dance skills!” He nodded to promise but couldn’t resist the chance to tease Bea just a bit more.

“For someone with no memory of her, you are very hung up on Milly Weaver.”

“Who is she!?” Bea shouted, pounding on Alan with balled up fists in a mock tantrum as he laughed but refused to answer.


End file.
